Your meals’ card and deposit rules are for guests booking online, so NomNom never stops you saving a booking over the phone. Instead, when the party is big enough to need a card or deposit, the booking is marked Awaiting card so you know to follow it up. There are three ways to do that.
What Awaiting card means
It shows on a booking your team made, with no card saved and nothing paid, for a meal whose card or deposit rule the party size meets. In NomNom Web it’s an amber Awaiting card chip in the bookings list, and Card: Awaiting card in the side panel. In the phone app it’s an amber card icon, and the booking says Awaiting card — booking not yet secured.
It’s only a reminder: the booking stays confirmed either way. It clears by itself as soon as a card is saved on the booking, or a payment is taken or recorded against it.
1. Take the deposit now: send a payment link
This is the only one of the three that takes money.
1. Open the booking’s payments. In NomNom Web, click the booking, then Full details, and open Card & Payments.
2. Click Payment link.
3. Enter the deposit. NomNom doesn’t fill in the meal’s deposit for you, so work it out: £10 a head for eight guests is 80.
4. Choose SMS or Email, then click Send.
When the guest pays, the payment appears on the booking, their card is saved and Awaiting card goes. The link lasts 7 days, and calls it a payment rather than a deposit, so tell the guest what it’s for. See Sending a guest a payment link.
2. Hold it with a card: Request card
Click Request card on the same tab, choose SMS or Email, and click Send. The guest gets a link to add their card. Nothing is charged, and if you have their email address they’re sent a Card Securely Stored email. The link works until the time of the booking. See Taking a card to hold a booking.
Once a card is saved, Request card becomes Charge, and you can take the deposit from it: pick Deposit under For, and the guest is emailed a Deposit Received receipt. Their bank may decline a charge the guest isn’t there to approve, though. If it does, send a payment link instead.
3. The Add Card button in the confirmation email
If the booking has an email address, this one happens by itself. The guest’s confirmation email is headed Awaiting Card to Secure Booking, says Your booking requires a card, and has an Add Card button. Like Request card, it saves a card. It doesn’t take a deposit, even on a meal with a deposit rule.
In NomNom Web: click the booking → Full details → Card & Payments. In the phone app: tap the booking → Card & Payments, where the payment link is the small link icon beside Record, and the card request is Request Card.
Good to know
- Only the newest card link works. Sending Request card switches off the confirmation email’s Add Card button, and resending the confirmation switches off the request. An old link shows Invalid Link.
- Took it on your card machine? Click Record and pick Deposit — see Recording card machine and cash payments. The payment counts, Awaiting card goes, and the confirmation email stops asking the guest to add a card. NomNom doesn’t email the guest a receipt.
- Not for cancelled or past bookings. NomNom won’t send a card request for a booking that’s cancelled or whose time has passed. If a booking is cancelled after you’ve sent one, the link tells the guest the booking has been cancelled.
- Stripe has to be able to take payments. If Stripe has paused card payments on your account, NomNom won’t send a payment link or card request, and tells you why — see Stripe says "Action Required": fixing a restricted account.
- Days don’t count here. Awaiting card goes by the meal and the party size only. A deposit you ask for online only on Saturdays still marks a Tuesday phone booking.
- Cancelling doesn’t refund a payment link. Automatic refunds only cover deposits paid online or charged as Deposit. Refund a payment-link payment yourself — see Refunding a deposit or card payment.
- Texts use your SMS credits, for payment links and card requests alike.